Equipment to assist the unloading of railway cars by means of tipping structures that turn the car to an unloading angle is known in the art.
This equipment, known as car dumpers, is a large scale structure that locks the car by way of an anchoring system and turns the car around its central axis to an angle of about 160° so that the load falls into silos, directing it to conveyor belts.
Thus, the car dumper unloading system basically comprises the dumper structure, one or more transfer silos, one or more feeders and a conveyor belt. The dumper can be adapted to unload more than one car, such that the quantity of the other components may be correspondingly adapted to the number of cars/quantity of load that will be unloaded.
The use of car dumper unloading systems poses a challenge associated to planning unloading times and speeds. In fact, for the unloading system to operate efficiently, it is necessary for the car dumper discharge flow to correspond to the desired flow for the unloading line or path.
The flow control of car dumpers is usually carried out manually, with operators manually adjusting the speed of the feeders to make sure that the flow obtained is equal to the desired flow for unloading and transporting without incidents.
When two silos are present in the unloading system, it is common for the operator to have to make relative adjustments so that the levels of the silos stay near one another. These adjustments basically comprise increasing or decreasing the difference in speed between the feeders of the two silos until a speed ratio is found that levels the remaining load therein.
Naturally, manual adjustment has various drawbacks. A first unfavorable aspect is the matter of time required for this kind of adjustment, but more important is the loss of productivity deriving from the inconsistency of the flow and also from the possible overload of the feeders.